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Why Is Obama Our First Black President?Kids' questions about his victory, and their parents' attempts to answer.

By Emily Bazelon and John DickersonPosted Friday, Nov. 21, 2008, at 4:00 PM ET

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When we asked black colleagues and friends how they were handling this with their kids, we got a similar response. And also a desire to spare kids the anger and mistrust they grew up with. "You don't have to have this conversation," said our colleague Lynette Clemetson, whose older daughter is 4. "I don't think black families are sitting around talking about how this is so historic to their young kids. Part of what's amazing is that to these kids, there's nothing odd about the picture of having kids in the White House who look just like them." In the final days of the campaign, Sen. Obama used this same image of his black children playing at the White House to spur African-American leaders to turn out the vote.

At the same time, when we talked about this issue on the Slate "Political Gabfest," we heard from black listeners who said our purported dilemma existed only for white parents because black kids can't avoid learning about racism and their parents don't try to shield them. "There was no reason to hide what happened because our people were the victims," Aisha Taylor wrote to us. To us, as white parents, it's reassuring to know that black parents differ from one another on these questions—a reminder that race doesn't dictate outlook. Surely some of the distinctions drawn depend on the ages of the kids involved. But there is also evidence that white and black kids tend to diverge in how they develop consciousness about race. From 3 to 5, research shows, kids start to notice race (or really skin tone) as a difference among groups. At 5 and 6, they tend to start endorsing racial stereotypes. If you ask them who is more likely to be the boss, both black and white kids will choose the white person. At 7 or 8, kids start to understand that their own race will not change. Some African-American kids start rejecting stereotypes and express group pride.

"What's interesting is that this doesn't seem to be related to parents' attitudes, as most people think it is," says Christia Spears Brown, a psychology professor at the University of Kentucky whom we called for guidance. Instead, kids pick up on cues from the segregation in their own lives, or stray comments, or the ever-guilty media.

Just a couple of years ago, in 2006, there was also the disturbing result of a study by psychologist Rebecca Bigler, in which 205 children ages 5 to 10 were shown a poster of all presidents and asked why there were no African-American presidents. A quarter said the reason was that it was against the law. One in three children attributed the lack of female, African-American, and Latino presidents to racial and gender bias on the part of voters. Another third of the kids said people in the excluded groups lacked the skills to hold the position.

The conclusion Brown draws from this is that "kids notice really early, and the problem is that adults don't talk about what racial differences mean, so kids draw their own conclusions, and their explanations are often very flawed." Brown, who is white, gave her almost-5-year-old daughter a simplified explanation about why Obama is our first black president. African-Americans didn't have as much money to run for president, Brown told her. Also, before, some people thought that someone with darker skin wouldn't be a good president. Now we know that's not true.

Maybe one of the most profound aspects of Obama's victory is that in a year or two—or maybe even right this minute—kids won't have to come up with a cockamamie reason to explain to themselves why there have been no black presidents. They'll have different facts from which to draw conclusions about the meaning of race. And then they can teach their parents what they know and see.

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Emily Bazelon is a Slate senior editor and an editor of DoubleX. John Dickerson is Slate's chief political correspondent and author of On Her Trail. He can be reached at . Follow him on Twitter.

Photograph of Barack Obama by Frank Polich/Getty Images.

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